Atlas
by HappierThanMost
Summary: A year after his parents' accident, Ponyboy reflects on all the changes and all the loss. And the new way he sees Darry.


_My apologies to anyone waiting on updates for my other stories, but I felt more like staying in my angsty little one-shot world a while longer! This story touches on the depression Pony felt in the time period right after the novel, and the changes that take place in the dynamic of Pony's and Darry's relationship because of it..._

 **ATLAS**

Everybody likes to call Darry Superman, but he reminds me more of that guy Atlas.

I don't recall every painful detail about that cold, wicked night; I don't want to. But I do remember the life and the air being sucked out of the house, and the helpless feeling of being dragged right along with it. Until that moment, my parents had been my center. And without them, I grasped at wind and felt myself hurtling lost through the black nothing. I feared how far I'd float untethered.

The officers left me where I stood, wrecked at thirteen. They walked down our porch and out the gate with all their sorries, slipping a little on the icy spots that Soda's shovel had missed. The door closed on the three of us and I, in ruins, watched as the shattered bits of my old existence rained down, soaking everything.

I blinked. I didn't see the exact moment Darry's body clenched to hold such weight. It would be another brutal year of more despair and loss before I'd finally open my eyes and understand that first night, the night my entire world settled hard on Darry's strained yet strapping shoulders.

People forget that Atlas was condemned to his position, never to be envied. When he lost the war he gained the world as punishment, forever pressing down, locking him in place. And that must've been exactly how it felt for Darry, imprisoned in a matter of seconds. Going forward no longer an option, his feet were tied cruelly to the old wooden floorboards, his hands twisted and cuffed to the doorframe. And when he lost it all he gained his heaviest and most important burden. Me.

xXx

"C'mon Pony, I ain't gonna tell you again. You better get a move on," Darry threatens and I stop myself from saying _or what_. "Or I'm fixin' to whup your ass." I roll my eyes when he answers _or what_ anyway.

"My throat's sore," I say from deep within my covers, trying to sound as hoarse as possible, sucking phlegm to the back of my throat for effect.

"Your throat's sore huh? Any other complaints? You got a hangnail that's botherin' ya? How 'bout your hair? Is it hurtin' too?" Darry finally pauses for a response I don't have.

"Maybe he started his period," Steve calls from out in the living room. This almost gets a rise out of me, but I just lie still and listen to the sounds of Darry finally walking away.

I overhear his quiet conversation with my brother down the hall. I don't miss the disappointment in Soda's whisper, "He ain't comin' is he?" and my throat suddenly does have that ache. As expected Soda's at my door with one final plea.

"You gotta come with us Pony. We're gonna tear up the strip tonight man. Who knows maybe I'll even buy you a hooker," he jokes, but not even Soda can change my mood. "You'd be down for that right?"

"Next time," I promise and turn awkwardly in my sheets with my clothes still on. "Could you flip out the light?" I request before he takes off, but he smirks and leaves it on to spite me.

I note how quickly Soda brushes off his concern, swept up by the energy of a Saturday night and before I can wrangle myself out of these jeans, he and Steve are blasting the car radio and gunning it down the street.

I don't hold it against him. There's no protocol for this kind of anniversary. Nobody said you have to mourn and struggle and bleed on the one year anniversary of losing your parents. There's no right or wrong way to spend that kind of milestone. Living it up on the strip or dying a little in your bed? Both seem appropriate.

I wad my sweatshirt in a ball and throw it, missing the hamper. It lands on the floor in the heap of other dirty clothes, other failed attempts. Darry's out there making a phone call and I try not to breathe so I can eavesdrop better.

"Hey babe it's me," and that lets me know it's his girl Laura. "Listen, sorry I can't make it out tonight," and the rest of his conversation turns into a whole bunch of apologies and explanations and harsher tones and finally a rude, gruff-even-for-Darry goodbye and a slammed receiver.

I want to go out and tell him he doesn't have to stay home. That he should stick to the plans he made with Laura. But I'm weighted down by guilt and grief and if I'm being honest, I'm too fucking selfish. I want him here. I want to be alone in my room. But I need Darry in this house.

So many ghosts now.

I would've never imagined Johnny wouldn't be here to live this through with me. Where's my best friend to share a look when some painful reminder pops up on the radio? Where's Johnny to speak for me when someone innocently asks where my father works or if my mom's picking me up?

 _The East Tulsa pool is rocking today and Johnny and I have scrounged up enough dough to pay our way in. We're tired of swimming and play cards to win a few smokes. Shepard's on a winning streak and I fold right when Chuck Berry's guitar explodes from the loudspeaker, electrifying the chlorine air. Nobody would be able to read our faces when Johnny gives me that look. Nobody would be able to tell if he held a straight flush or a hand worth shit, or what his smile for me even means from across the table. He shakes his head a little and I watch his eyes get softer, keeping me from losing it. I feel more than hear his quiet breath of a sad laugh, heartfelt, and I know he's remembering how my father loved this old song about the Louisiana country boy, and how Johnny B. Goode was the name Dad always called him. Go Johnny go..._

Johnny 'B. Goode' Cade killed somebody... for me. Does Dad know that?

How did this happen? Cause I'm still reeling. Why is everyone else going on? Even my hair has the audacity to grow out from the blonde. And every day Johnny fades away a little more.

The impossibly tough Dallas Winston won't hold up against time either. Soon maybe his spirit won't stop in our kitchen anymore and tip back in his chair and pretend to listen to my mom go on, as if she had any kind of street cred or knew what real problems were, Dallas Winston size problems anyway. But in his eyes maybe she got it. Maybe he sensed another side to her. I'll never know. They're both wiped away, vanished. Only to appear in memory, dimming with each season.

Four people dead in a year. Four very big people in my life. And I feel swallowed up by their creeping shadows. I cut myself against all the torn and jagged-edged possibles and maybes they left behind.

I wish I could be normal. I wish I could run around with Soda and find solace in socializing, feed more off the outside world like he does, instead of turning so far in and trying to pull myself from under layers and layers of tissue and muscle and pain. I'm a scab picker. I pick and pick and won't stop till I bleed. And only then do I get my warped salve.

My mind won't ever let up. I can't catch my breath before it's kicking me once again while I'm down. _I'm down dammit. How far down can you possibly want me to sink?_ Till I'm crying out, begging on skinned knees for mercy I guess. Until I'm pathetic enough to lie in bed all day on a Saturday and keep Darry worried and home to watch over my weak and sorry ass I suppose.

Darry. There's always Darry.

Hard to believe I spent the better part of the year fighting him no holds barred, bitterly raging at him when he tried to be my father and then punishing him hard whenever he wouldn't. The words I yelled come back from a forgotten Awards Day...

 _"Darry you can't boss me. You ain't no parent to me. A parent doesn't forget their kid. You ain't Dad." I'm shocked to hear myself screaming as Darry thunders toward me up the hall._

We lived through hundreds of kitchen table brawls that Soda refereed, mostly keeping us from tearing each other apart...

 _"Pony if you say one word I swear to God." My blood boils just hearing Darry talk down to me like that._

 _Nothing on earth could keep me from opening my mouth now. "Word," I say with acid dripping off my tongue, and rise to escape him as he grabs for me across the table, chairs tumbling and dishes disturbed, Soda yelling at us both._

 _"Dammit what the fuck is wrong with y'all? We can't eat a meal in peace no more?"_

And of course, the one volatile night Soda failed to pacify, his presence actually fueling the flames. I can still feel the sting of Darry's palm, my split decision run, the hit that managed to shake up most of Tulsa for a solid week. And of course, Darry and I could both drown in all our regret from that night if we let ourselves. But Soda would never allow it. So we march forward like he wants us to.

I'm no picnic, and Lord knows Darry ain't. He continues to be on my case, can't stop himself from telling me what to do, won't let up, never understands me, is quick to anger, yells to prove a point, the list goes on and on.

And now it scares me to think how much I need him.

The very things that made me come close to hating him are now the very things I cling to, the only things that keep me going to school, going to track, doing my homework, putting two feet on the floor every morning, bothering to comb my hair, facing the dipshits who still whisper about me in every period. Essentially, he's the reason I'm continuing to function in a cold, dark world. He brings rules to follow, structure, stability, and like Atlas, he's holding up my everything cause I sure can't do it right now. And all the while he tells me I'll be back to myself before long. I'm almost starting to believe him.

I hear a basketball dribble outside, then pound against the headboard over the shed. Hard to fathom how much has changed since last year. The weather for one thing. Last January was more like a frozen wasteland, while tonight holds the velvet air of spring. And to say I'm not the same would be an understatement. I guess it was bound to happen though; there's a big difference between thirteen and a half and fourteen and a half. But I've also lived a hundred years inside twelve short months. And pain and loss have a way of hardening and softening you all at once. I've both aged a lifetime and regressed back to helpless child. I'm changed. In every way.

I listen to Darry mindlessly shooting baskets out there and I try not to feel too guilty that he must be bored out of his skull to stay home with me. And both the rhythm of his basketball and his simple presence lull me...

xXx

"Ponyboy," Darry whispers and his hand lightly grips my chin, shaking it. "Wake up Pony," and I feel out of it as I squint and try to focus.

"Huh?" I ask confused, wondering how long I've been asleep. "What time is it?" and my stretch works to bring me back to life a little.

Now that I'm fully conscious Darry's returned to his normal demanding tone. "C'mon, I want you to get up and try to eat a little somethin'. Then you need to brush your teeth." I sit on the edge of my bed and nod my head to all of it. "Did you even take a shower today?"

"Yeah," I grunt and he looks back at me before leaving the room. His eyebrow shoots up as he gives me a hard look.

"You better be tellin' the truth little man," and he sounds so much like Dad I can't even get mad he doesn't trust me. He gives my door frame a quick rap on his way out and he's still going on, even louder as he walks down the hall. "I ain't askin', I'm tellin' you to do it so c'mon let's go. Move it."

And I find myself following his voice like a ship to the beacon, putting one foot in front of the other, grateful. And I answer so faint he doesn't hear me, "Okay Darry."

 **A/N:** The Outsiders by SE Hinton, Johnny B. Goode by Chuck Berry

 _Thanks once more to all you fun and encouraging readers! Ahh maybe one day I'll grow out of my obsession that is the relationship of Darry and Ponyboy Curtis.._


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